brickclubfandomcom-20200213-history
1.1.4-Stormhornets
Brick!Club Chapter 4 – In Which M. Myriel is charming and sarky and there are also quite serious things happening later Case in point (and possibly favourite bit in the chapter): “There is M. Geborand purchasing paradise for a sou.” More opportunities for the sun to shine out of M. Myriel’s every orifice. First off, I kinda like the fact that Mlle. Baptistine and Mme. Magloire accompany him everywhere and he seems to actually really respect him (“he put himself on a level with the two old women who had passed their lives beside him”). And he acknowledges the fact that Mme. Magloire respects him, teasing her lightly for it “my greatness grandeur does not reach as far as that shelf”, as she calls him “Your Grace Grandeur”. Permit me a moment to just squeal with the sheer cute of the mental image of our apparently short Bishop and a mildly scandalised looking Mme. Magloire. What follows this is basically another chapter devoted to Myriel being as sarky as possible and charming enough to not get lynched for it – he sasses Mme. la Comtesse de Lo who’s ranting on about her natural heirs while Myriel’s seemingly staring into the distance and ignoring her. And then when she gets pissed off and bugs him to pay attention, this gem: “I am thinking … of a singular remark, … ‘Place your hopes in the man from whom you do not inherit.’” Right. I want a Myriel, where can you get a Myriel? Hugo said, after his son objected to Myriel’s presentation as “a prototype of perfection and intelligence” and wanted someone like a doctor instead, that “this Catholic priest Myriel, this pure and lofty figure of true priesthood, offers the most savage satire on the priesthood today.” The thing about Hugo was that his religious views changed hugely as his life went on; he identified as Catholic when he was young and then went on to be a non-practising Catholic and expressed anti-Catholic and anti-clerical views – essentially, like Voltaire, he was a deist, a believer without religion. Personally, and I’m probably way off point here, I’m of the opinion that his issue was with the church itself and what they had turned religion into, rather than belief on its own. Now, the point of all this was to sort of explain the “savage satire” quote – obviously Hugo didn’t have the highest opinion of the church at the time but I guess through Myriel he was lightly mocking it by showing how bishops etc. should act. ‘Cause Hugo never directly attacked the doctrines of the church but he sure as hell alluded to it. Anyway, onwards. Da da da, making a mockery of death and man’s view of death – a man is apparently worth more alive than dead, with the “burden of titles is cheerfully imposed on him”; humans are arrogant as fuck for “pressing the tomb into the service of vanity”. I guess the family name is worth more than the individual. And boom, mood whiplash and taxes. My favourite quote makes an appearance! A sermon about charity is given, rich M. Geborand tries to buy his way into heaven, M. Myriel grins and makes witty remarks. You never get the impression he’s trying to mock, though, why is that? Whatever he says is with a smile and this air of I don’t know, like benevolence? Once again, we have mention of Myriel being the people’s man; an eloquent speaker and “he understood how to say the grandest things in the most vulgar of idioms” – easily relatable to all. Even when his parishioners (?) begin to get a little uneasy with some of what he says – “everyone … growing angry very quickly” – he’s able to calm them quite easily. Another favourite bit here: “the faults of women, of children, of the feeble, the indigent, and the ignorant, are the fault of the husbands, the fathers, the masters, the strong, the rich, and the wise.” who seemingly don’t give a shit. And then Hugo mentions that Myriel “had a peculiar manner of his own of judging things: I suspect he obtained it from the Gospel”. Now, I’m not too well versed on the Bible etc. but the Gospel is the part that describes the life of Jesus, yes? It seems to me that Myriel’s views and opinions of equality etc. come directly from the Bible rather than from the church that, in Hugo’s opinion, was a bit corrupt. I think this is one of the actual main points of this chapter: when Myriel befriends a man who was condemned to death for murder and he accompanies him from the moment of his sentencing to execution, comforting him all the way when the priest who was meant to attend dismissed the case with “I have nothing to do with that unpleasant task.” When Myriel descends from the guillotine, having just witnessed this man that he comforted for a day when he didn’t even have to, he’s completely shocked by the whole affair; “it was a long time before he recovered from it.” Think about it; imagine comforting someone and bringing them back to the light and taking away their fear and then watching their head get chopped off. Pretty damn horrific. We’ve got a few more musings on death, about how humans are horribly arrogant presuming to govern death – “by what right do men touch that unknown thing?” which links to something from the third paragraph about the deceased gentleman of the countryside (see above). To concluuuuuuuude, our dear bishop is through and through the people’s man, something we already knew; but the main point in this chapter seems to be about his views on death and the church as a whole. (Ah, something’s just occurred to me; you can potentially take the priest who was meant to attend on the accused man as a representation of the church as a whole vs. Myriel whose beliefs seem unclouded by sort of what the church’s viewpoint was. Now, using that, we have the priest who dismisses the common man’s plea and thus a sort of metaphor of the church not particularly helping the common man vs. Myriel who well. There’s a whole load of very bad analysis about him up there ^. He places himself with the most in need in his parish and walks with them for as long as necessary. S’kinda lovely.) Anyway, I was concluding. No, wait, I think I’m done. “And death shall have no dominion”, la la la. Commentary Sarah1281 Well, I think that the priest who was meant to attend and who did normally do that kind of thing was sick and it was just hard to find a replacement as the cure didn’t want to do it. They’d have a lot more problems if they couldn’t get their own prison chaplain to do his job! Stormhornets (reply to Sarah1281) Very true but consider what he actually said - “That is no affair of mine. I have nothing to do with that unpleasant task, and with that mountebank: I, too, am ill; and besides, it is not my place.” Out of what, three or four statements, only one refers to the whole being sick thing. Sarah1281 (reply to Stormhornets' reply) I’m not saying that the cure was ill, just that the cure was never the one who was supposed to do that. The prison chaplain was the ill one and he was the one who was supposed to do that. The would-be replacement was the one making excuses. Stormhornets (reply to Sarah1281's reply) I think I may be misunderstanding something here and it’s bugging me. Also, the word “cure” is starting to look weird. Right. Yes, the chaplain of the prison fell ill. Yes, a priest was needed to attend the criminal. I thought the cure just reported the priest’s reply saying “I’m ill, not my place, blah” to the Bishop who then took on the duty. Am I completely off base here? Sarah1281 (reply to Stormhornets' reply) Here is what the chapter says: On the eve of the day fixed for the execution of the condemned man, the chaplain of the prison fell ill. A priest was needed to attend the criminal in his last moments. They sent for the cure. It seems that he refused to come, saying, “That is no affair of mine. I have nothing to do with that unpleasant task, and with that mountebank: I, too, am ill; and besides, it is not my place.” This reply was reported to the Bishop, who said, “Monsieur le Cure is right: it is not his place; it is mine.” So I read it as the chaplain, who usually attended to these things (and would get totally fired if he refused to do his job) was ill and unable to perform his duty this once. They did not want to execute the man without some sort of religious authority being present so tehy sent for the cure. The cure did not want to and just said that it wasn’t part of his job description, not being a prison chaplain himself. Another indication that it is not the same person is that he said that he too is ill as in he is ill in addition to the chaplain. And then the bishop says that the cure is right in that it is not the cure’s place to fill in for the chaplain but his place. Stormhornets (reply to Sarah1281's reply) Ahh. Too many ill people >:c Sorry, don’t think I saw the “too” and thus this all spiralled into weirdness.